DeFrancesco matured from young phenom to jazz music master

Courtesy of Joey DeFrancesco

Joey DeFrancesco

Grammy nominated jazz organist Joey DeFrancesco has been one of music’s young guns ever since he emerged on the scene at the tender age of 17.

Then, having come from nowhere to claim the mantle of the great Jimmy Smith by signing a deal with Columbia Records and joining the legendary Miles Davis Band, the description seemed apt.

But that was 23 years ago, and over the years DeFrancesco has slowly, almost imperceptibly, morphed from teen phenom to steady master

“It seems I’ve been the young guy most of my career,” says DeFrancesco, who performs Saturday at the Germantown Performing Arts Centre. “As you get older the age thing doesn’t really matter. I don’t feel any different than I was when I was 18. But I am 40, and it’s just that I’m like a veteran now.”

Last year, two months after he turned 40, DeFrancesco looked to separate himself from his youth by making his 29th record, aptly named 40. Coming on the heels of 2010’s Never Can Say Goodbye: The Music of Michael Jackson, a Grammy-nominated record that stands as his most popular work, the new collection may be the organist’s most intimate.

Besides being a superb showcase of the signature style he has developed over the years — a mixture of Smith-style blues and soul with some of the more out-there touches of Larry Young — the record contains songs dedicated to his wife (“Gloria”) and two children (“Donny’s Song” and a reworked version of “Ashley Blue” from the 2000 compilation of Hammond B-3 music, Organ-Ized).

“I’d never really done anything like that before,” says DeFrancesco of the expressly personal nature of the material. “It was kind of a birthday celebration, a way to get the whole family involved in the project.”

One member of the family missing from the credits was DeFrancesco’s father, “Papa” John. The son of a member of the Dorsey Brothers Band and a respected weekend musician himself around Joey’s hometown of Philadelphia, it was “Papa” John who first plopped Joey in front of Hammond B-3, a portable, electric organ common in popular music, when he was just 4 years old.

By the time DeFrancesco was 7, he was sitting in with dad at gigs. At 10 he was jamming with the like of Hank Mobley and Philly Joe Jones and leading his own combos. At 16, he signed his deal with Columbia and released his first record, All Of Me, a year later.

“Now that I look back on it, I was pretty advanced for that age,” says DeFrancesco. “I was playing in a very mature way. I was playing better than a lot of guys who were 30 or 40 years older than me at 10.”

Though it was his father who got DeFrancesco started on the organ, there has never been any doubt whom his role model for the instrument has been.

“Jimmy’s the boss,” says DeFrancesco of fellow Philly native Jimmy Smith, who popularized the organ in jazz beginning in the 1950s.

Smith dominated jazz magazine Downbeat’s prestigious critics’ and readers’ polls in the organ category from its introduction in 1964 until his death in 2005. That year DeFrancesco, who won the critics’ poll seven times between 2002 and 2008, took his place on the reader’s poll where he has remained ever since.

“When I heard (Smith) I knew that was where I wanted to go,” says DeFrancesco, who featured Smith on his 2005 release Legacy, one of Smith’s last recordings. “That was the standard to which I knew I had to get to.”

Not surprisingly, DeFrancesco got there pretty fast. Since then he has absorbed lessons from the long list of musical legends he has played with as a sideman, including guitarists John McLaughlin, Larry Coryell, and Kenny Burrell and, or course, Davis.

“That was a huge step to play with Miles,” says DeFrancesco of joining the late trumpet giant for the 1989 album Amandla. “He taught me about the use of space in music. When you’re playing, don’t work things to where you have to play everything perfect. If you’re not making mistakes you’re not trying hard enough. That was his philosophy, and I agree with that to this day.”

Though he is a firmly established artist in his own right, DeFrancesco continues to work on others’ projects. He has spent a good part of the last three years touring with saxophonist David Sanborn’s acclaimed soul-jazz combo. He has an upcoming tour with some other later-day Davis band alumni, including bassist Darryl Jones and drummer Omar Hakim, in a group called Miles Smiles. And he continues to pay back his father for giving him the gift of music by helping on his dad’s recordings, playing trumpet on “Papa” John’s latest, last year’s A Philadelphia Story. (Brother Johnny DeFrancesco is an acclaimed jazz guitarist.)

As for his own music, perhaps turning 40 has triggered a need for a change in DeFrancesco. After performing with the same trio for 20 years, he has recently of late begun experimenting with different players. His Memphis date will include longtime guitarist Paul Bollenback along with drummer Jeremy Thomas, making just his second appearance with the organist.

“If you do something for a long time, the only way you’re going to get new ideas and fresh perspective is to bring new people in,” says DeFrancesco. “Everybody brings a different element.”

Joey DeFrancesco Trio

8 p.m. Saturday at the Germantown Performing Arts Centre, 1801 Exeter Road. Tickets: $35 and $45, available at the box office, by phone at (901) 751-7500, and online at gpacweb.com.

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